Opening Network-Enabled Electronic Documents

1. A method implemented by one or more servers to provide access to an electronic document, the method comprising: intercepting, at a request handler associated with a server, a request received over a wide-area network from a client computing device to open an electronic document available in a document library accessible by the server, wherein the request, if not intercepted, would cause the specific software application to open the electronic document, wherein the request is generated when the user selects a link from a webpage, and responsive to the electronic document being closed, presenting the webpage; determining, without user interaction, that the electronic document should be provided through a dynamic server-generated web page instead of being accessed by the specific software application; dynamically altering, without user interaction, at the request handler, the request to include a location of a dynamic server-generated browser page capable of accessing the electronic document; and transmitting data to the client computing device over the wide area network for rendering the electronic document in the web browser on the client computing device.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving, in response to a query, an indication from the client computing device that the specific software application capable of accessing the electronic document is not installed on the client computing device.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving an indication that the specific software application capable of accessing the electronic device is installed on the client computing device but the electronic document should be accessed by the server instead of the specific software application.

4. The method of claim 3 , further comprising requesting access to the electronic document in the dynamic server-generated browser page.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising: requesting information from the client computing device about whether the client computing device has access to the specific software application capable of accessing the document directly on the client computing device.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the request comprises a Universal Resource Locator (URL) for the electronic document within the document library.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the request was initiated by a user selection of an embedded icon in a document.

8. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving the specific software application's version and the electronic document's version, and determining that the client computing device does not have access to the specific software application if the specific software application's version is not compatible with the electronic document's version.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising determining whether the electronic document was previously selected to be opened only in the web browser and, if the electronic document was so previously selected, causing the web browser to open the electronic document.

10. The method of claim 1 , further comprising determining that a file extension associated with the electronic document is for a type of document capable of being opened in only one of the web browser or the specific software application.

11. The method of claim 1 , further configured to receive the specific software application's version and the electronic document's version, and determining that the client computing device does not have access to the specific software application if the specific software application's version is not compatible with the electronic document's version.

12. A computing system comprising: a processor; an electronic document data store; and computer storage memory having computer-executable instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the processor, implement a method to access an electronic document from the electronic document data store, comprising: receiving an indication that the electronic document is attempting to be accessed by a client computing device; determining that the client computing device does not have access to the specific software application capable of accessing the electronic document; identifying a network resource capable of accessing the electronic document; dynamically altering a network request by appending one or more parameters to the network request for accessing the electronic document, wherein the one or more parameters comprise an encoded server-relative path to a file associated with the electronic document, wherein the appending is performed without user interaction other than a user selection to access the electronic document, wherein the one or more parameters comprise an encoded absolute path to the network resource capable of accessing the electronic document, wherein the encoded absolute path is used by the web browser to navigate back to a specific web page when the electronic document is closed; and transmitting data over a wide area network to the client computing device for rendering the electronic document in a portion of a dynamic server-generated browser page.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein the method further comprises querying for additional information regarding whether the client computing device has access to a specific version of the software application associated with the electronic document.

14. A computing system comprising: a processor; an electronic document data store; and computer storage memory having computer-executable instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the processor, configure the computing system to: intercept, at a request handler associated with a server, a request received over a wide-area network from a client computing device to open an electronic document available in a document library accessible by the server, wherein the request, if not intercepted, would cause the specific software application to open the electronic document, wherein the request is generated when the user selects a link from a webpage, and responsive to the electronic document being closed, presenting the webpage; determine, without user interaction, that the electronic document should be provided through a dynamic server-generated web page instead of being accessed by the specific software application; dynamically alter, without user interaction, at the request handler, the request to include a location of a dynamic server-generated browser page capable of accessing the electronic document; and transmit data to the client computing device over the wide area network for rendering the electronic document in the web browser on the client computing device.

15. The system of claim 14 , further configured to receive, in response to a query, an indication from the client computing device that the specific software application capable of accessing the electronic document is not installed on the client computing device.

16. The system of claim 14 , further configured to receive an indication that the specific software application capable of accessing the electronic device is installed on the client computing device but the electronic document should be accessed by the server instead of the specific software application.

17. The system of claim 16 , further configured to receive request access to the electronic document in the dynamic server-generated browser page.

18. The system of claim 14 , further configured to: request information from the client computing device about whether the client computing device has access to the specific software application capable of accessing the document directly on the client computing device.

19. The system of claim 14 , wherein the request was initiated by a user selection of an embedded icon in a document.